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A couple dressed up as a "Catrina and Catrin", a Mexican character also known as "The Elegant Death", kisses as they participate in a procession to commemorate Day of the Dead in Mexico City, Mexico, Oct. 28, 2017. REUTERS/Edgard Garrido
Dancing devils, towering skeletons, and altars festooned with marigolds made their way down Mexico City's main thoroughfare on Saturday to commemorate Day of the Dead in a country still mourning nearly 500 people killed in earthquakes last month.
President Donald Trump delivers remarks to U.S. military personnel at Naval Air Station Sigonella following the G7 Summit, in Sigonella, Sicily, Italy, May 27, 2017. REUTERS/Darrin Zammit Lupi
"I am directing the Secretary of Defense, and the Secretary of Homeland Security with respect to the U.S. Coast Guard, to return to the longstanding policy and practice on military service by transgender individuals that was in place prior to June 2016."
Image via RNS/Creative Commons/Bureau of Land Management
In a move many Native American and religious groups have feared, President Trump reportedly will shrink the boundaries of Bears Ears National Monument in southeastern Utah.
The Salt Lake Tribune reported an account Oct. 27 from Utah Sen. Orrin Hatch’s office in which the president said: “I’m approving the Bears Ears recommendation for you, Orrin.”
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Scores of clergy have signed their names to statements opposing the white nationalist groups’ values. They have planned community prayer vigils celebrating diversity and advocating for unity. And, ahead of [the] Oct. 28 protest, they have sent a strong message that hate is not a religious value.
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Overall, giving to religious causes amounted to close to a third of all charitable giving in 2016, Giving USA says. Religious institutions received $122.94 billion that year, or 32 percent of charitable donations. That figure is more than double the amount received by educational institutions, the next highest sector within nonprofits, which garnered $59.77 billion.
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The right of Jehovah’s Witnesses to adhere to their faith’s rejection of military service — they believe their allegiance is to God alone — is recognized in the U.S. and other Western countries. But Tajikistan has no law concerning conscientious objectors.
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Of 1,131 active-duty service members, 30 percent surveyed that white nationalism poses a greater threat to U.S. national security than ISIS conflicts in Syria and Iraq, as additionally reported by Newsweek.
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A judge on Wednesday refused to block President Donald Trump's decision to end subsidy payments to health insurers under Obamacare, handing Trump a victory against Democratic attorneys general who have regularly challenged the president's policies in court.
Image via Conservative Concerned About the Death Penalty study named "The Right Way: More Republican lawmakers championing death penalty repeal."
“This is a system that is broken; we shouldn’t trust this system when we’re got the evidence to show that it doesn’t work,” said former Nebraska state Sen. Colby Coash. Nebraska was the first red state to abolish the death penalty.
Image via REUTERS/Carlos Barria/File Photo
The administration also will place on hold a program that allows for family reunification for some refugees resettled in the United States, according to a Trump administration memo seen by Reuters and sent to Congress on Tuesday. The resettling of so-called following-to-join refugees will resume, according to the memo, once screening "enhancements have been implemented."
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Just how religion plays into our biological impulse for empathy is not yet clear. One study from the University of Chicago shows that religious upbringing is associated with less altruism. Other studies have shown the contrary; a University of Warsaw study found that religious beliefs are positively associated with empathy, as empathic skills are crucial factors for religion.
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Amid revelations that extremist groups have exploited social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter to influence voters and steer readers toward fake-news, the nation’s premier anti-Semitism watchdog is training its eye on the tech world to combat hate speech online.
The Anti-Defamation League will hold a summit in San Francisco on Nov. 13 featuring Reid Hoffman, the co-founder of LinkedIn, along with executives from Facebook, Twitter, and Reddit to discuss ways of fighting the growing menace of cyber hate.
Image via Menachem Wecker / Sojourners.
It’s easy to associate the worst crimes of the Nazi regime with the leading villains — Adolf Hitler, Hermann Göring, Heinrich Himmler, Joseph Goebbels. But it took countless faceless bureaucrats, sitting in offices, pushing paper, and drafting plans, to enable the Nazi state. The manufacturer J.A. Topf built the crematoria, and coal miners and steel makers produced raw materials for the machinery of the concentration camps.
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“A lot of times churches are trying to preserve the legacy of who founded the congregations founded long ago,” said Elizabeth Eaton, the presiding bishop of the ELCA. “When you try to hold on to something so tightly, you strangle it. Taking a risk while being faithful to the core message of grace is my advice.”
Image via Shutterstock.com/Katherine Welles
The three white nationalists, Tyler Tenbrink, William Fears, and Colton Fears, were charged with attempted homicide by Gainesville police.
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Global pollution accounts for approximately 9 million premature deaths every year, according to a report by The Lancet Commission on Pollution and Health.
The comprehensive study found that pollution is linked to 1-in-6 deaths globally — accounting for three times more than AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis combined, The Guardian reports.
2. On the Political Uses of Evil
The trouble with contemporary political uses of evil isn’t the concept itself, but rather the intentional vagueness thrust upon it by an era without any well-defined theory of the good.”
Campaigning outside a Berlin church for elections on July 23, 1933. The banner says “Vote for List 1, German Christians.” Image via RNS/Wikimedia Commons.
Most visitors to events in Germany marking this year’s 500th anniversary of the Reformation, however, probably didn’t expect to find an exhibition setting out just how extensively the Nazis used Luther to justify their anti-Semitism and nationalism.
Image via Rebekah Fulton/Sojourners
“The administration is going to challenge it [the court’s halt] and continue to try to make sure it [the ban] happens, ” said Isra Chaker, one of the speakers at the rally and a campaigns advisor at Oxfam America focusing on refugees.
Image via Reuters/Abdi Sheikh.
In the aftermath of a Oct. 14 truck bombing that killed over 300 people in Mogadishu, Somalia, thousands of people took to the capital's streets in response to mayor Thabit Abdi's call to unity, according to The Guardian.